Entertainment

'Scandal''s first new episode of 2015 was nothing like what we expected -- in the best ways.

Image: ABC

By Katherine Brodsky2015-01-30 15:08:01 UTC

One way to describe Thursday's return of Scandal is heart-poundingly intense. It gets our hopes up and plays ping-pong with our emotions.

One moment Olivia is dancing with Jake, plotting a grand finish atop a piano; the next, she’s gone. Red wine spilled all over her pristine cream couch, with Jake chasing after her kidnappers' black SUV in his underwear.

While Jake was busy reporting (to Quinn?) the license plate number of the car that presumably had taken Liv, we soon learn that the car was indeed a decoy. Olivia is actually still in the building — in her neighbor’s apartment. The kidnappers monitor Jake on screen, jeering "Run Forrest, Run!"

They wear masks and black paint over their faces, but the moment they take them off and reveal their identities, we know we’re heading for real trouble. Liv’s poor elderly neighbor is shot dead, and they mange to get Olivia out by disguising themselves as EMTs.

When the kidnappers pose as EMTs in the ambulance to get away tho...too smart #Scandal#TGITisback

In the ambulance, Olivia defies her kidnappers by refusing to negotiate for her life; she knows that their leader is missing and that they won't kill her without his instructions. But as one of the men warns her: "There are worst things than death."

Next thing she knows, she's injected with something sinister.

She wakes up in a dirty, worn-down, prison-like cell. Neither Liv nor the viewers know exactly where we've been transported. We're disoriented, confused, and as much as Liv might hate to admit it, scared too. Kerry Washington nails it.

But she's not alone. Her cellmate is a journalist named Ian, who seems like he's been there for a long, long time. He's half crazy and 100% scared. Something seems off about him. Olivia tries to calm him, as she does. She tries to give him hope. She promises him they'd get out of there — and that if she's missing, the president of the United States himself would not stop looking for her.

On each visit to a disturbingly disgusting bathroom, a guard tells Liv, "Five minutes and I'm coming in." In the dirt, there's a glimmer of hope, as Liv notices a window. She can almost open it by using the underwire in her bra. A glimmer of hope in the darkness.

But before she gets to escape, she is promptly caught. Her punishment is Ian's death. Remember that line about how some things are worse than death? Well, being responsible for someone's death is definitely included in that.

Liv collapses, and all hope leaves her body. It doesn't take long for Jake to arrive and save her; in fact, it seems too easy.

Next, she's sharing a hot steamy shower with Fitz, in Vermont, where they live together. Fitz is now a mayor, and Liv … well, she makes jam.

And now we know she's downright hallucinating.

We see another familiar figure: Abby. Somehow she becomes the voice of reason. "There's no man to rescue you," she says, "You're the only gladiator left in the place. You have to rescue yourself."

Liv renews her vow to escape, once again relying on her underwire — every girl's secret weapon. But she falls madly apart, sobbing uncontrollably when she discovers that the window has been sealed with bricks.

This isn't the end of the road; after all, this is Olivia Pope we're dealing with, a girl who from an early age was trained to be twice as good. So Olivia hits her guard over the head with a pipe, grabs his keys and makes a run for the red door. On the way, she even pulls a trigger on another guard that stands between her and that door.

She gets to that door. Every second our hearts pound faster, harder. There are so many damn keyholes! So many keys! Every moment counts.

Finally, the door opens. No! It's all wrong. There's a movie screen in front of her, projecting false images — she's not outside, she's in a warehouse. Everything is a lie.

And there's "Ian." He's the man behind the curtain, the puppeteer behind the ruse. All this theatricality has been about extracting information… and now he knows two things that we've known all along. 1) Olivia always has to save everyone, and 2) The president will do anything for her.

The nightmare is only beginning. Hold on to your hearts! It's going to be a roller coaster ride. Because in Liv's world, no one gets to dance in the sun for long.

Katherine Brodsky is a femme fatale trapped in the mind of an entertainment writer. Her work has appeared in Variety, Entertainment Weekly, Playboy Magazine, USA Weekend, MovieMaker Magazine, Backstage, Complex, Elle Canada, and many others. Follow her on Twitter @mysteriouskat.

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